


Closing Time

by yourcrookedheart



Category: Roswell New Mexico (TV 2019)
Genre: Multi
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2019-02-18
Updated: 2019-02-18
Packaged: 2019-10-31 00:20:23
Rating: Mature
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 3,324
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/17838818
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/yourcrookedheart/pseuds/yourcrookedheart
Summary: Everyone in Roswell has a secret. Maria is no exception.Or; Maria shares a moment with Michael and figures some things out.





	Closing Time

**Author's Note:**

> This was inevitable, really.

A few weeks ago, while sharing decade-old memories and Rosa’s stale weed under a starlit sky, Liz had said Roswell was full of secrets. She’d been referring to more than just her sister, though Rosa’s death often feels like the starting point, or maybe the eye of the hurricane around which all of the town’s mysteries revolve. 

Born and raised in Roswell, Maria’s got a couple of secrets herself. 

For example, though she likes to keep a little mystery, Maria can’t actually read minds.

What she does isn’t a scam, exactly—not the way she sees it. Whether they end up coming true or not, her predictions gather a satisfied audience of people who only came to her door for her to tell them what they wanted to hear anyway. So she gives them what they want, and what they want is a promotion at work, true love, a lucky inheritance. 

Easy.

The key to fortune-telling is that it’s not so different from being a bartender. Her clients share the common trait of feeling the lack of something in their lives, and whether they drown their sorrows in booze or turn to superstition for some comfort, Maria provides all. It doesn’t hurt that drunk customers often spill enough of their woes that she could start an extortion business if she’d feel inclined, but as it is the knowledge comes in handy enough when pretending to channel the murky planes of the future as well.  

Another thing fortune-telling and bartending have in common: both can make you rich, if you play your cards right.

Tonight’s quiet, though, not a night for any kind of fortune. There’s a few regulars hanging by the bar, a couple of hours and plenty of beers away from drunk enough to kick out. A stray tourist is letting locals rob him of his cash over a game of pool. And at the other end of the bar, always a loyal client but a permanent fixture for the past few weeks, sits Michael Guerin, nursing a drink he’s not going to pay for tonight. 

“You gotta settle your tab someday, Guerin,” she says, sidling up to him and enjoying the slow smile he graces her with. He’s a hassle sometimes, on nights when what he’s looking for isn’t a quiet drink but a fight, and she has to call Max yet again to come pick up his friend. But he’s damn charming when he wants to be. 

Easy on the eyes, too. 

He throws back the last few drops of Jim Beam, throat moving beneath his day-old stubble, and slides the empty glass towards her. “Way I see it, I should be getting a discount. I keep your bar in business, don’t I?”

“By raiding my supply of bourbon and beer and never paying for it? Danny Campbell’s a better customer than you.”

They both glance to the side, where the grizzled old man pats his hapless tourist victim on the back and pockets a few bills. Michael turns towards her with both eyebrows raised. “Now that’s just insulting.”

“I saw you doing the same thing last week,” Maria says, because at this point scamming vagrant tourists who end up at the Wild Pony is a local sport, and Michael can swindle with the best of them.

He shrugs, shameless at being caught out. “I made it up to him later.”

“TMI, man.” 

Pouring him another drink, she has to use her best poker face to weather the look he’s giving her, a look that exposes her for the liar she is. She moves on after that, to the other end of the bar to entertain her other customers for a bit, letting them flirt with her because she knows Alan Reeves tips well when he’s in a good mood and Dick Ferguson’s wife is cheating on him with his best friend. All that time, Michael doesn’t move from his spot, part of the scenery in the way the pool table and the dark mahogany bar are.    

Unlike Ferguson or Reeves and most of her patrons, Michael doesn’t talk. 

Or, more accurately, he talks too much, but never about anything important. He flirts, trash talks the other customers—often loudly and with volatile results—but he doesn’t overshare like the other ones do. She could write a book on all the dirty little secrets of Roswell, has shared some of them over drinks with Liz and Alex and Elena, but aside from a couple of hook-ups, Michael Guerin may as well be a blank slate for all she knows about him. 

She knows it’s part of the appeal. If she knew everything about him, every deepest secret and darkest desire, she probably wouldn’t let him stay after the last patron has trudged home, sprawled across the bar with his elbows spread wide and his head resting in his palm. The mystery benefits them both. 

His eyes track her as she cleans up. She takes her time because by now she’s learned to identify impatience from his myriad expressions. “You could always give me a hand, you know,” she says, sweeping a broom beneath his feet and not so accidentally jostling him in the process.

He barely moves as he murmurs, “Nah, I’m good,” low and with enough intent to make her sweep just a bit faster. 

His truck is parked outside, halfway across a no-parking space. This doesn’t always happen. Most nights, Maria’s either tired from a long day serving or manages to hold on to her dignity long enough to kick him out before closing time, along with the other customers. But then there’s nights when Michael’s been looking at her a little too long. When his shirt sits just right across his chest, when she’s lonely or horny enough to crave a little company. 

She grabs the car keys from his hand and climbs into the driver’s seat, waiting for him to catch up. “How have you not lost your license yet?” she asks once he’s inside.

Michael shrugs. “I have, couple times,” he says, before he turns to look out the window. 

He’s uncharacteristically quiet for the rest of the drive. Anyone else, she’d call them out on it, try to wrest something out of them, but that’s not how the two of them roll, so she just steers the car in silence along the dirt tracks out of town.

She’s only read his future once, years ago when they were still in high school, at the Ortecho family diner one night. There was a time Maria spent most of her evenings there, along with Alex and Kyle and Liz and Rosa, the five of them stuffed into a booth. She’d never seen Michael Guerin or either Evans at the diner before that night, but suddenly there they were, occupying a table in the corner in their predictable co-dependence. 

Back then, Michael’s loner cowboy thing seemed a little more suave than sad, and his eyes barely left their table the whole time they were there. Maria only remembers because it seemed endlessly amusing then, a bunch of teenagers bored out of their minds in a small town, where the local bad boy’s attention was worth at least two weeks of frantic rumors and giggling. 

Then Rosa, brash and probably stoned and always the one to instigate, nudged Maria’s side with the weight of a whole extra year of experience behind her smirk and dared her to approach him. Maria, who just started doing palm readings, had known less about Michael than she does now. She was also seventeen and sensitive to peer pressure. 

He laughed at her. Not in a mean way like Isobel, not even then, but genuinely amused. It’s strange how she can remember details from that night but not the actual prediction, except for the fact that it must have been way off. 

She doesn’t think she’d fare much better if she tried again now. 

Michael’s trailer looks like a white beetle in the darkened desert. Impossibly small, like no one could ever live there, especially not someone like him who takes up so much space anywhere else. She’s never seen it during the day, but she doubts it looks more impressive then.

Once, she considered taking him home to her place. The thought of Michael—stained shirt, criminal record, smelling like cheap whiskey Michael—between her sheets seems impossible to imagine. 

There has to be a line here, somewhere. 

He takes off his shirt once they’re inside, no show, no brandishing for her benefit. She doesn’t come here for romance and candles and the last guy who tried to wine and dine her ended up being a jerk of such epic proportions she doubts even Michael could match him, but part of her wonders if he doesn’t want more. More than this town and a job at the junkyard, endless days peppered with meaningless one-night stands and a not-quite-friends-with-benefits situation with a bartender. 

Part of her knows he must. Another part of her still doubts it. 

It’s dark in the trailer, only the moon and stars filtering through the trailer’s dirty blinds, and in the dappled light Michael looks less harsh. There’s a heat in his eyes that has her reaching for the buttons of her shirt, before he gets to her and offers his assistance, undoing them with his good hand while she pulls her skirt down in the cramped space between the cupboard and his body. 

Her clothes join his on the floor. She spares a thought for the way they’ll look in a few hours before he’s lifting her on top of the kitchen cabinet, crowding her space. His lips trail a path along her collarbone, up to her neck and ear as she wraps her legs around his waist and pulls him in. 

This is a secret that only exists in the breath between their kisses—rarely more than once a month, usually in Michael’s trailer, occasionally in his car, and on one memorable occasion, on the bar’s pool table. It makes her feel like a teenager sometimes, except she wasn’t having sex in high school. 

Michael was, probably. 

No one knows because there’s nothing to tell, and, if she’s really being honest, because telling her friends she’s hooking up with Michael Guerin would feel like a confession. And just like Michael’s relentless stare gets to her because she doesn’t know the story behind it, his lips against her throat feel hotter when they’re a secret.

He’s got his hand in her bra, warm and calloused which is hot in its own way, her own hands sliding across the muscles of his back and trying to get him closer. She’d probably be more comfortable on the bed, but this is part of the experience as well. 

“Fuck,” she gasps when he repositions them and brushes against her just right, and the both of them startle a little at the sudden sound. He hasn’t said a word since they left the bar, she realizes. It’s not like they have deep conversations, ever, but their foreplay tends to be a little higher on the teasing.  

She nearly asks him if he’s okay, before realizing it would probably ruin the mood. 

They make it to the bed eventually, toppling onto the thin mattress with her legs astride his hips. It’s good, because it always is. Maria’s twenty-eight and sex with a freeloading patron of her bar is one of the most reliable and satisfying things in her life, and the worst part is that she can’t even bring herself to regret it. 

He fucks her the way she likes, then, steady and just on the edge of rough, the only sound between them their panting breaths. The bed’s too small and her elbow bangs against the wall ever so often, but he lets her come first, scraping his teeth against her jaw as she arches against him.

“You good?” he asks when they’ve disentangled themselves and the sweat is cooling on her skin, curbing some of the heat in the tiny space. 

She hums, willing herself upright to get to her clothes, then realizes she doesn’t have her car.

“Your pillow talk could use some work.” Leaning up on one elbow, he’s cocky in the way he gets after sex he knows she enjoyed, and she’s about to call him out on his hypocrisy when she hears the rumble of an engine. 

She looks at him. He seems just as surprised as she is. “You expecting company?” she asks, gathering the sheet around her just in case. 

“Probably Isobel,” he says when the knock comes, like it’s normal for people to show up at his door in the middle of the night. Maria would curse whoever it was for disturbing her sleep and then burrow deeper into her pillow. Michael gets up and hunts for his pants between the pile of clothes, then opens the door. 

It’s not Isobel Evans. 

It takes Maria a second to recognize the voice, before Michael’s closing the door behind him, and then it takes her another few seconds to wonder what kind of military business could send Alex out here in the middle of the night. Then she looks out of the window, catches Alex’ eyes, and figures it out. 

Her stomach drops. She didn’t know that was a thing outside of books, but apparently it is, because every single time Alex has mentioned his mystery guy flashes across her eyes in seconds, up to and including last week when he was four drinks in and heartbroken, and she let him crash on her couch because she didn’t want to drive him home to his father like that. 

She curses silently. Realizes she’s naked beneath the sheet and quickly pulls on her clothes. 

The walls of the trailer aren’t thick and she can hear traces of a conversation, barely enough to make out the words. She doesn’t want to be an audience to this, but she can’t leave either. 

How did she not know this?

Of all the things to miss, it had to be this. She reads people for a living, whether it’s tracing the lines of their palms to spell out their perfect futures or fixing them drinks and playing therapist once dusk sets in. Now she only feels infinitely stupid, sitting here in the dark and waiting until they’re done arguing, knowing that if she’d gone home tonight like she’d planned, if Michael had picked up someone else, she’d be waking up tomorrow to a string of texts from Alex that would require a lifetime of friendship to decode.  

After what feels like an eternity, an engine rumbles to life, wheels turning in the sand and fading away. It’s another few minutes of silence before Michael enters again. He leans against the sink, rubbing a hand across his face, and says nothing. 

She huffs out a humorless laugh. “You’re really just gonna stand there.”

“I’m sorry, you wanted to have a heart-to-heart? Braid each other’s hair and talk about our  _ feelings _ ?”

“What the fuck is wrong with you?” She can’t remember the last time she was angry. Working in a bar there’s not a lot that fazes her anymore, but she feels it burning through her veins right now. Michael looks tired, like all he wants to do is crawl into bed. Tough luck, because Maria’s just getting started. 

“You’re a piece of work, you know that?” She shakes her head when he looks away. “What was it, ruining Alex’ life wasn’t enough, you had to get to his friends as well?” 

“Yeah, yeah, that’s exactly it,” he says, dryly. “I’m just out to ruin everyone’s day.”

For some reason it makes her angrier, the way he’s not even trying to defend himself. She thinks of Alex driving home right now, and his face when he’d recognized her through the window. “Do you care about anything?” she asks, but she may as well be trying to get an emotional response from the fridge. 

Michael frowns like he’s fighting a headache. “You should go.”

“Fuck that.” She gets up, crowding his space. He turns his head towards the window, making her mourn the few inches he has on her. “You’re the guy that broke my friend’s heart. I should be hunting you down with a shovel, not sleeping with you.”

Somehow, that’s what gets his attention. “Is that what Alex said? I broke his heart?” He seems to find this amusing for some reason, though he makes no attempts to elaborate. If this is how he deals with conflict, this evasive, impenetrable apathy, Maria’s at a loss as to how Alex ever managed to put up with him at all. 

“What’s that supposed to mean?”

“Nothing,” he says, smiling tightly. “It means nothing.”

It’s such a blatant lie, she wonders why he’s bothering at all. Because once she’s calmed down enough to look at him, really see him, she realizes—he’s bad at lying. It’s in the rigid line of his shoulders, the way he tenses his jaw, which means he’s good at hiding but useless when called out on it. Isobel was the same. 

Maria can read Isobel. 

She can read Michael.

“Why do this to yourself?” she asks.

He shrugs. “Masochism?” 

“Don’t try to be cute.” 

He leans his head back, knocking it against the cupboard. “I’m pretty sure that’s the source of all my problems, actually.” Slowly, he turns his head until he’s looking at her, his eyes hidden beneath the shadows of his curls. “What do you want me to say?”

“Whatever’s true and won’t make me want to punch you.”

He’s quiet for so long, she thinks he won’t answer her at all. But then looks at her, as serious as she’s ever seen him. “This,” he says, waving his hand between the two of them, “had nothing to do with Alex. I just wanted something that was mine, that’s all.”

There’s about twenty different layers to that response, of which she can only uncover about three, and at least one of them feels like a lie. It hasn’t escaped her notice that he hasn’t apologized, and he doesn’t look very remorseful. Just exhausted. Fed up. Something Maria can relate to, at last. 

They stand together in the dark of Michael’s trailer, lost to their own thoughts, as outside the stars rest in the sky, silent witnesses to everything.  

“Seriously though, you gotta go home,” he says eventually, probably aiming for humorous, though it comes out weary and bare. 

She remembers why she couldn’t just leave in the first place. “Don’t have my car.”

He sighs. For a second she thinks he’ll offer to let her stay, but then he says, “I’ll drive you home,” shrugging on a shirt and grabbing the car keys from where she’d dropped them earlier. 

There’s a part of her that’s still furious, but directing that anger at Michael feels wrong somehow, when he’s like this. It leaves her feeling unsated. Remote. 

It’s more than she wants to deal with tonight. 

Ricky greets her at her gate, his paws clawing at the fabric of her skirt. She gently lowers him to the ground and turns towards Michael, who’s leaning against the wooden fence. He’s got his hat on, and combined with the frayed jeans and shirt, he looks every bit the rogue cowboy. Usually, this kind of visual is exactly the one that makes her itch to get her hands on him. 

“Night,” she says, and he tips his hat, already halfway back to ironic. 

She digs her phone out of her pocket once he’s gone and she’s back inside, curled onto the couch with Ricky in her lap. The house is quiet, only the the horses of the nearby farm still up. 

_ Need to talk. Call me pls?  _

She sends the message, then rests her head against the pillows, and waits for a response. 

**Author's Note:**

> Come find me on [tumblr](queennsansa.tumblr.com).


End file.
